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Stage of development

Not sure that this is the right topic buuuuut....If your Christmas videos were any sign of progression i'm kind of terrified. I mean i'm sure it was a last minute thing but it was so hard to watch. No offense to the guy who was filming but his voice and stuff was so monotone and tiring, he didn't seem all to organized and the videos themselves i would of just done without. The reason i'm even bringing this up is that the game has a 2 year development in mind? (I believe i read it on the kickstarter, if i am mistaken sorry) And that said the character creator is suppose to be coming out before that.

Changing the subject a bit of why i'm a little edgy is just... Well... i played Valiance Online and well..it made me sick, it was so horridly done. I feel like they just gave it for the public eye as a 'testing phase'. It is just so broken. A shell of Atlas park with cruddy modifications....

Hence why im kinda like.... please pleeeeeease don't make the game bad *sob sob*. Another reason i don't feel very reassured is that i STILL haven't gotten my Anthem shirt which was supposed to be shipped last year (Technically) and if it is so hard to organize that... how much hard is making a game? Anyways just venting my concerns is all. I wish you the best of luck and will wait.

(Also i feel like another part is like... don't rush the game if it isn't done.. just make the creator for use to paw at while we wait - And so sorry about the scatterbrained post with topics everywhere jumbled up)

I'm still willing to chalk a lot of this up to the debatable honor of getting to see things behind the "developers' curtain" that we might collectively be better off not seeing right now.

Don't get me wrong: I love every pixel and/or bit of data the Devs decide to let us see at any given moment to satisfy my ever-ravenous curiosity. My point is that we need to be constantly aware that anything we see now is very much a "work in progress" and it's far too easy to make false assumptions and conclusions based on such vague glimpses.

Sure we'd all love for CoT to be ready to go now but that's just not the case. Until then any half-finished thing we see is going to be as much disappointing as it will be enlightening. This is a classic Dev dilemma of just how much (or how little) they ought to be showing us at any given time for our own good. *shrugs*

Hi dell56v, I can't speak to the shirt orders, as I'm not involved with them, but I can say that even some of the fellow devs had difficulty in receiving shirt orders even though we were able to confirm they were comfirmed to be sent through by the person who processed the orders on our end. Keep in mind that the shirt ordering system was meant as an initial test for ordering processes to work through our cash shop, as stinky as it is, I'll send this link over to see if the problem can be tracked down for you.

With regards to your comments of VO - they allowed people to enter in their early stage alpha, which is more likened to prototype that is slowly being worked into an alpha stage game. There will be plenty that goes wrong, is unfinished, or completely missing in such a phase of game design.

Now as to CoT's development, its true that things initially began over 2 years ago, but quite a lot happened in that time. Actual work on the game proper was in the very, very early stages with a lot of people inputting a ton of ideas of what to do / what not to do and some analysis of what CoH had going on. During this time the develop visions went into different directions which saw the initial split of two different groups working on a spiritual successor. VO came about later.

The company behind CoT had to be created. There were rifts in direction for this as well which saw the group split off again. Due to this split, the nature of the number of splinter groups there was cause for concern over what could and couldn't be used of any previous game design documentation for direction of the game. Initial work with an engine (or I should more accurately say the bulk of early work) was done in UE3. But after our KS, Epic offered us an early access to UE4 (this is before they opened the license to anyone who wanted to purchase it). Which after review it was decided the potential of UE4 offered over UE3 was worth the loss of work and effort in migrating what could be saved.

Just las year we completed pre-development - that is getting all of our intial design documents in place, enough for departments to begin work in creating systems. We had to resolve legal issues revolving around how the company operates. And we are working with an engine that is still in development. Due to this, there are times where something being worked on has to be redone because base engine functionality came along and made it better to go with what is provided within the engine over the coding done through it, and at times, something we want to work on is being held off because we know that something is being worked in with the engine which will help with the desired function.

Now I must defend my fellow dev who shot the video, he was the person who was sort of the (un)lucky one to have a camera pointed at his screen when he was working on some stuff and when it was seen, there was a decision made to include it with our 12 (13) days of devmas and he was asked to put in a few more. The videos were provided to show just a tidbit of where we are at with just a tiny piece of the behind the scenes / under the hood systems that will go into the game.

The avatar creator is being worked on. As are other portions of the game, including many systems that go beyond the avatar creator. Please also keep in mind, we are all volunteers, no one is getting paid for their work, and many put in time after working full time and then some. The downside of volunteer efforts is people lose steam, they drop in and out, and organizing the chaos falls on the shoulders of our leads to keep things moving along. It is sort of a catch 22, we need a successful game in order to compensate the people who put in the effort to create it, but we need the people to put in effort to create a successful game without any compensation. None the less, most of who are working on the game do so out of a desire to see it become a success for no other reason than they want to return to a world that was lost to them, their friends, family, and to gaming audience at large.

—

I don't use a nerf bat, I have a magic crowbar!
- Combat Mechanic - Tech Team.

I've spent a lot of time here on the forums over the last few days, scouring for any job that I could help with, pouring over all the posts regarding the philosophical direction of this development. "Excited" barely does my emotional state justice.

I heartily appreciate the 12(13) Days of Devmas. It was a fascinating peek under the hood that the vast majority of gamers never get the opportunity to see. It showed the maturity of the game components functionality as well as cleverness running below the technical prowess driving the effort.

Was it pretty? Not always. But I compare it to SpaceX's recent Dragon launch. Their primary mission goal was to get supplies to the space station, and that was where almost all of the focus was tuned. Landing the Falcon 9 stage one booster on a barge was a secondary goal (with staggering implications for the future.) So too were the Days of Devmas. I very much want the volunteers to charge forward making a spectacular game, and not so much time creating shiny dog and pony shows (though to be honest, that does need to be done as well at some time.)

I think we all need to remember that, because MWM is designing this game from the bottom up, they are putting more work into the theory, numbers, and mechanics now and the "shiny" surfaces will come more towards the end. At least that's how I understand it.

I appreciate the roughness of the videos, because they are a true peek behind the curtain, not a flashy PR stunt designed to distract us. (Nothing personal, Shadow Elusive!) I have just worked for enough companies where I have seen salespeople give system demos that I knew didn't represent the actual state of the system. What we're seeing may seem raw, but I think it's quite genuine. I also appreciate the risk a company like MWM takes in showing us stuff like this.

There is a LOT of tech even in the videos we've seen so far. And while Odo does not represent what I want to see as a FINAL model.. he shows me MANY important things about the character model (looking at the different skins and surface textures for example). Also I really generally LIKED the design of the 12 items they showed.

I would like the wings to be more gossamer and less solid, I definitely want the text on the PR sword tightented. I wish the Dragon had its own skeleton and walked or flew..

But instead of focusing on what I want to see, when I take a second to look and ask myself what am I looking at.. what are they showing me.. I'm quite impressed. If the tophat is an example of one costume piece I think it's a good indication of what costume assets will be able to do with textures and the like.. also there was no comic outlining.. I loved that. The character model can move and jump so I get to look at some EARLY physics of the game. The model is holding weapons in socketed slots... MULTIPLE weapons even.. two in the hands and one on the back!

Sure I could focus on the fact that the fingers didn't close or that the wings didn't flap or plent of other things I DIDN'T see.. but if everyone were to have that same attitude they should just hole up and not show us anything but the final game. I do NOT want that.

After reading the amazing responses i went back with a more technical mind set. And yeah that is pretty cool how an item can have multiple things on it (as a small example). Also thanks for all the reassurances! That said... GIVE ME MY T-SHIRT! Haha.

It's not entirely obvious, but just from the glimpses you are able to see (which is not at all anything a normal thing a game would allow, but we are not a normal game company) you could surmise that the lore of the game is pretty much set, art is starting to snowball (and it is marvelous stuff) and the technical aspect is starting to come together. MWM has many departments and they are all working for you on one thing; City of Titans. Each is banging things out fairly well at this point and the further we go, the momentum keeps carrying on. There are/were/will be potholes in the road, but at this point we are on track and (if possible) more excited than ever to be involved.
As a community based company we will continue to share as we have been. It may be risky to show raw stuff, but it is what we would want to see if we were on the other side of the dev curtain.

The avatar creator is being worked on. As are other portions of the game, including many systems that go beyond the avatar creator. Please also keep in mind, we are all volunteers, no one is getting paid for their work, and many put in time after working full time and then some. The downside of volunteer efforts is people lose steam, they drop in and out, and organizing the chaos falls on the shoulders of our leads to keep things moving along. It is sort of a catch 22, we need a successful game in order to compensate the people who put in the effort to create it, but we need the people to put in effort to create a successful game without any compensation. None the less, most of who are working on the game do so out of a desire to see it become a success for no other reason than they want to return to a world that was lost to them, their friends, family, and to gaming audience at large.

Having worked on half a dozen games that never made it into any kind of testing phase, I found this post very encouraging. The only way any project like this will ever make it into production is with dedication and great sacrifice. I'm hoping this one holds together and produces a game. Well, to be completely honest, I'm hoping all of the current teams working on "spiritual successor to CoH" projects succeeds. The more the merrier! I'm certain each one will be unique and challenging in its own way.

Also everyone, please remember that Cities had issues at launch (and throughout its lifespan), and was still pretty awesome.
I'd not panic over what are still pretty early glimpses at the game.

This, I really hope that people don't jump the gun if this game has issues like every other MMO. CoH and V certainly did have some issues at launch. I see to many people set unrealistic expectations for an MMOs launch. I have faith in the devs but I would't be surprised if there would be issues to iron out.

conquererworm wrote:
Also everyone, please remember that Cities had issues at launch (and throughout its lifespan), and was still pretty awesome.
I'd not panic over what are still pretty early glimpses at the game.

This, I really hope that people don't jump the gun if this game has issues like every other MMO. CoH and V certainly did have some issues at launch. I see to many people set unrealistic expectations for an MMOs launch. I have faith in the devs but I would't be surprised if there would be issues to iron out.

+1

CoH was pretty messy at different points and got a lot of flack for it. Some things were too broken to ever fix. But it was still an amazing game.

Okay, wait. Why the heck is no one getting paid for this? I mean, I know they get paid AFTER the game makes money, but seriously. Oh man, I'd have a hard time justifying working on a project for free too.

Okay, wait. Why the heck is no one getting paid for this? I mean, I know they get paid AFTER the game makes money, but seriously. Oh man, I'd have a hard time justifying working on a project for free too.

We can afford to pay people, or to make the game, simply put.

—

Technical Director

Read enough Facebook and you have to make Sanity Checks. I guess FB is the Great Old One of the interent these days... - Beamrider

Okay, wait. Why the heck is no one getting paid for this? I mean, I know they get paid AFTER the game makes money, but seriously. Oh man, I'd have a hard time justifying working on a project for free too.

Passion, benevolence, and the sincere hope for mutual benefit in the future. Look at the open-source software community. There exists a free and open-source implementation of practically any software package you can think of, and many developers contribute freely to these projects while asking for nothing in return. Why? It benefits everyone.

I know that might sound a little "Kumbaya," but there are certainly people willing to donate their time to things they believe in.

jsnforce wrote:
Okay, wait. Why the heck is no one getting paid for this? I mean, I know they get paid AFTER the game makes money, but seriously. Oh man, I'd have a hard time justifying working on a project for free too.

We can afford to pay people, or to make the game, simply put.

Or another way to put it; If we payed people, we couldn't make the quality of game the community deserves. It may get done faster by contracting out pros, but it wouldn't be the game we set out to make. It is indeed a passion project for all of us.

I will take this time to once again wish good will and success to the developers of this game. I have found nothing else that I feel worthy of my time to play since CoH went away. It is also a sincere wish that the developers get rewarded for their time effort and passion in a very monetary way. I so much hope that this could be an inspiration to all the others that may follow in your steps, as well as a wake up call to all the giants who keep prettily packaging garbage because so far it has been a good way to make money. Cheers to all you CoT developers!

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I reserve the right to have an opinion. You reserve the right not to agree.